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Gopher Wire Roll - 5' x 100' - Galvanized Steel
Gopher Wire Roll - 5' x 100' - Galvanized Steel
Gopher Wire Roll - 5' x 100' - Galvanized Steel
Gopher Wire Roll - 5' x 100' - Galvanized Steel
Gopher Wire Roll - 5' x 100' - Galvanized Steel
Gopher Wire Roll - 5' x 100' - Galvanized Steel

Gopher Wire Roll - 5' x 100' - Galvanized Steel

SKU x5100
$302.08 - $302.08
$302.08
$302.08 - $302.08
$302.08
Free Shipping

Gopher Wire · Galvanized steel · 5' x 100'

A 5' x 100' roll of double-galvanized steel gopher wire — 500 square feet of 3/4" hexagonal mesh, woven from 20 gauge wire, for protecting lawns, beds and planters from pocket gophers. The galvanizing is done twice: electroplated, then hot-dipped again after the mesh is woven, so the coating covers the crossings and cut ends where ordinary galvanized wire starts to break down.

Roll Size
5' x 100'500 sq ft coverage
Mesh Opening
3/4"Hexagonal, 20 gauge
Material
GalvanizedDouble hot-dipped, electroplated galvanized steel
In-Ground Life
6–10+ yrEstimated material lifespan
  • Blocks young & mature gophers
  • Roots grow through freely
  • Research-backed 3/4" mesh
  • 100 ground staples per roll
  • Free shipping on all orders

Free Shipping - Please submit a Quote Request for quantities larger than listed below.

Quantity Price Per Unit

(Free Shipping)
1 $302.08
2+ $286.98
3+ $271.87
10+ $256.77

01 Galvanized steel gopher wire

Galvanized Steel Gopher Wire Roll — 5' x 100'

A 5' x 100' roll of double-galvanized steel gopher wire — 500 square feet of 3/4" hexagonal mesh, woven from 20 gauge wire, for protecting lawns, beds and planters from pocket gophers.

The galvanizing is done twice: electroplated, then hot-dipped again after the mesh is woven, so the coating covers the crossings and cut ends where ordinary galvanized wire starts to break down. That gives an estimated 6–10+ years in the ground, at a noticeably lower cost per square foot than stainless. Free shipping on every order.

Close-up of galvanized steel gopher wire hexagonal mesh
Double-galvanized, 20 gauge, 3/4" hexagonal mesh.

6–10+years in-ground material lifespan

Electroplated first, then hot-dip galvanized again after weaving — that second dip coats the cut ends and crossings where plain galvanized mesh starts to fail.

02 Why it works

Purpose-Built For Gopher Exclusion

The whole product is one number: a 3/4" hexagonal opening. Wide enough that grass and plant roots grow through unencumbered, tight enough that neither a mature gopher nor a young one can get a head through. Woven from 20 gauge galvanized steel, so they cannot chew it either. That combination is what separates purpose-built gopher wire from general-purpose mesh.

Lawn & Turf Installation Guide

03 Product data

Specifications

Product codex5100
Roll size5' x 100'
Coverage per roll500 square feet
MaterialDouble hot-dipped, electroplated galvanized steel
Estimated material lifespan6–10+ years
Mesh typeWoven
Wire gauge20
Mesh opening3/4" hexagonal
Ground staples required100 per roll — sold separately
ShippingFree — California deliveries typically arrive in two business days
Each roll needs 100 ground staples for a proper installation, and they are sold separately. We recommend ordering them together with the wire; they are listed under accessories below.

04 Where it goes

What Gopher Wire Can Protect

Engineered for both residential and commercial work. Anywhere a gopher can tunnel up into, wire underneath will stop it.

Sod areas Seeded grass areas Putting greens Artificial grass & turf Garden beds (in-ground) Raised garden beds Planter boxes Paver patios Child play areas Pathways Sports fields Gravel driveways Golf courses

05 The 3/4" question

Research-Backed Mesh Size

For decades, both galvanized and stainless steel mesh with a 3/4" opening has been used to protect landscape areas from gopher intrusion. A study from the University of California, Davis, conducted in 2009, reiterated the point.

University of California, Statewide Integrated Pest Management Program, Publication 7433, September 2009 (revised July 2019).

Is smaller mesh better?

No. Mesh size can fail in either direction. Too large an opening lets young, smaller gophers straight through. Too tight a mesh chokes the roots of nearby trees and plantings. At 3/4" you stop both young and mature gophers while leaving enough room for everything you actually want growing to come through unencumbered.

06 Built for the job

Features

Strong

Constructed from heavy-duty galvanized steel.

Permeable

Water passes straight through to grass and plant roots.

Blocks mature gophers

Stops fully grown gophers passing through.

Blocks young gophers

Stops young and developing gophers, the point at which larger mesh fails.

Rot resistant

The double-galvanized coating gives excellent resistance to underground rotting.

Allows plant growth

The 3/4" opening will not choke roots.

Allows lawn root growth

Healthy lawn growth is unaffected at this mesh size.

Purpose designed

Manufactured specifically for gopher protection rather than adapted from general-purpose netting.

07 Installation

Simple, Straightforward Installation

The video below covers installation in a lawn area. It can be installed under a wide range of surfaces, and the job is well within reach of a homeowner as well as a landscape contractor.

Printable Lawn & Turf Guide

Cross-section diagram showing gopher wire installed beneath a layer of topsoil with sod above
Under-sod installation, in section.

The Soil Layer Above The Wire

The detail that catches people out is what sits between the wire and the sod. Gopher wire is not laid directly under turf — it goes down first, and then a layer of soil goes over it before the sod does.

  • Cover the wire with 1 to 1½ inches of soil, spread to a uniform depth and rolled smooth.
  • That layer keeps a gopher's snout away from the root crown of the grass plant, which is what the barrier is ultimately protecting.
  • Sod laid straight onto the mesh leaves the crowns within reach and makes the finished lawn harder to keep level.

The full sequence — preparing and rolling the area, overlapping courses by 3 inches, stapling every 18 inches, then soil and sod — is set out step by step in the printable guide above.

08 In the ground

Customer Installations

Gopher wire goes in under a wide variety of surfaces. These are real installations by customers.

Gopher wire mesh rolled out across a prepared lawn area
Rolled out over the prepared subgrade.
Topsoil being backfilled over installed gopher wire
Topsoil backfilled over the wire.
Gopher wire covered with soil ready for turf
Covered and graded, ready for turf.
Sod being laid over an installed gopher wire barrier
Sod going down over the barrier.
Established lawn growing over gopher wire mesh
Grass established over the mesh.
Raised planter box lined with gopher wire
Lining a raised planter box.
Finished raised planter protected against gophers
The finished planter, protected.
Gopher wire unrolled up to a retaining wall edge
Run right up to a retaining wall edge.

09 From a customer

What Installers Tell Us

"After tilling and clearing the loam from our yard, I installed the gopher wire roll. I then applied another 6 inches of topsoil/compost and then laid 1,800 square feet of zeon zoysia sod. The gopher wire roll is an incredible product and in my mind worth every penny. I have already seen the results."

"There is an adjacent section where our yard meets the neighbors yard. Given the frequent watering/worms, etc. our yard has become an attractive site for moles. Well, our yard has been perfectly protected from the moles, and our neighbors yard is full of new holes and tunnels. They just cannot seem to penetrate the wire roll. The quality is also impressive. Does not even compare to the junk available at 'unnamed big box' hardware store (trust me, I looked!)"

Colin R. — Austin, TX

10 A common question

What About Moles?

Gopher wire is not designed to prevent mole intrusion. That said, a number of customers have installed it for that purpose, and it has proved effective at deterring moles from tunnelling into landscape and lawn areas.

The two are straightforward to tell apart when diagnosing damage: a gopher mound is a crescent or fan shape with the plug set off to one side, while a mole mound is a symmetrical cone with the plug at the center.

11 Free shipping, every order

Shipping Time

Free shipping on every order. Gopher wire ships from Northern California and typically leaves the same day if the order is placed before noon Pacific Time.

Smaller orders ship UPS or FedEx. Larger orders — typically five rolls or more — ship LTL freight, and the carrier will schedule a delivery appointment with you before delivery. Orders shipping to California usually arrive within two business days.

Transit times on the map are shown in business days, are approximate, and exclude weekends and holidays.

Map of United States ground transit times in business days for gopher wire orders
Click to enlarge.

12 Background

How to Stop Gophers Damaging Your Lawn and Garden

Property owners in gopher-prone areas are usually familiar with the damage. Gophers feed on plants, and over a short period they will destroy a garden and gnaw through irrigation lines and sprinkler systems until the system fails. The mounds are unsightly, but the damage below ground is the costly part.

Identifying a gopher den. Look for loose dirt in half-circle or crescent-shaped mounds with the plugged hole off to one side. Freshly formed mounds mean an active animal, and one gopher can produce several in a single day. A mole mound is different — circular, with the plug in the middle.

What Does Not Work

A number of control methods are widely sold for this problem. Most have limited effectiveness:

  • Traps deal with the symptom rather than the cause, and have to be run year after year.
  • Baits and toxic chemicals can harm wildlife, pets and children.
  • Owl boxes add predators but do not reduce the population enough to stop the damage.
  • Repellents — no product currently sold has been shown to protect plantings.
  • Gopher purge, castor beans and garlic have not been shown to drive gophers off.
  • Vibrating stakes, ultrasonic devices and pinwheels have not succeeded in trials.
  • Smoke and gas cartridges fail because gophers seal their burrows off very quickly.

What does work is a physical barrier. Before planting grass or laying out a bed, put 3/4" gopher wire underneath. The mesh sits between the gophers and your plantings, they cannot get through it, and it continues to work without chemicals, maintenance or repeat treatment.

"We decided to use this galvanized gopher screening on the new lawn because there was a lot of damage to our previous lawn from gophers coming through — we have a lot of areas where gophers are very active and putting in a new lawn without adding some defense would be a total loss." — Edward, San Diego, CA

13 Buying from us

Why Buy Gopher Wire From Landscape Discount

Authentic, professional-grade wire

Purpose-made galvanized steel gopher wire, engineered for in-ground service. Not general-purpose netting sold under a landscaping label.

No "no-name" or off-brand wire

We do not stock it, so you cannot accidentally buy it here. What arrives is what the specification above says.

Labour is the expensive part

On a gopher wire installation the excavation and the sod cost considerably more than the wire itself. Installing low-grade mesh and having to lift the lawn to replace it is the expensive outcome — do it once, do it right.

We answer the phone

When you call you quickly reach a helpful, live person happy to answer your product and order questions. (M-F 5:00 am - 3:00 pm Pacific Time)

14 You will also need

Accessories And The Other Roll

Carton of 240 ground staples for gopher wire

Ground staples — 240 carton

Required for installation. Each roll of gopher wire needs 100 staples to secure it correctly.

View Ground Staples
Speed pin ground staple driver for gopher wire

Speed pin staples

Faster fixing on large areas. Recommended where more than one or two rolls are being installed.

View Speed Pins
Roll of stainless steel gopher wire

Stainless steel — 4' x 100'

T304 18-8 stainless, 25+ years in ground. The choice where lifting the finished surface to replace it would be costly.

View Stainless

15 Common questions

Gopher Wire FAQs

How much wire do I need?
Measure the area you want protected in square feet. This roll covers 500 square feet at 5' x 100'. Allow a little extra for overlapping adjacent runs — you want continuous coverage with no gaps for a gopher to find.
Stainless steel or galvanized?
Both use the same 3/4" hexagonal mesh at 20 gauge, so they stop gophers identically. The difference is how long they last buried. Galvanized gives 6–10+ years; stainless gives 25+ years. Under a lawn, or anywhere that lifting the finished surface to redo the work would be costly, the stainless is generally worth the difference.
Why 3/4" mesh and not something tighter?
Because tighter mesh chokes the roots of nearby trees and plantings. Too large lets young gophers through. 3/4" is the size that stops both young and mature gophers while letting everything you want to grow come through. UC Davis research supports it.
Will grass roots grow through it?
Yes. The 3/4" opening is deliberately sized so lawn and plant roots pass through unencumbered. Water drains straight through as well.
How deep do I install it?
Under a lawn, the wire goes below your topsoil layer — commonly around 6 inches of topsoil or compost over the top before sod. In a planter box, it lines the base. The printable guide above covers lawn and turf installation.
Do I need staples?
Yes. Each roll needs 100 ground staples to hold the wire flat and in position while you backfill. They are sold separately.
Will it stop moles?
It is not designed for moles. Customers who have installed it for that purpose do report that it deters them from tunnelling into the protected area, but we do not sell it as a mole barrier.
Can I use chicken wire or hardware cloth instead?
Chicken wire is the wrong gauge and the wrong opening, and it corrodes quickly underground. Hardware cloth is generally too tight and will restrict root growth. Gopher wire is manufactured to these dimensions for a reason, and the cost of the wire is small relative to the cost of lifting an established lawn to replace it.
Does it rust?
In time, which is what determines the service life. Being galvanized twice — electroplated, then hot-dipped again after weaving — is what pushes it to 6–10+ years underground rather than the couple of seasons you would get from ordinary galvanized mesh. Where a longer service life is required, the stainless roll is rated at 25+ years.
Can I cut it to fit?
Yes, with tin snips or wire cutters. Wear gloves — cut ends on woven mesh are sharp.
How fast does it ship?
Same day if you order before noon Pacific Time, Monday to Friday. Smaller orders go UPS or FedEx; five rolls or more typically ships LTL freight with a scheduled delivery appointment. Shipping is free either way.